Peter Gay: The game, the rivalry, the history | Columns | thesunchronicle.com – The Sun Chronicle
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It was the dawn of the Roaring Twenties when officials from Attleboro and North Attleboro high schools decided to renew their gridiron rivalry in November 1921.
Young men from the two communities, which were once a single town, have met in late November ever since for football bragging rights in spite of the many wars, assassinations, terrorist attacks and other tragedies that have taken place.
North Attleboro, then known simply as the red and white, blanked the blue and white of Attleboro 12-0 on Nov. 20, 1921, four days before Thanksgiving Day at Columbia Field, less than 100 yards award from the south end zone of where Saturday’s centennial game will be played.
Twenty years later, legendary coach Howard Tozer’s Attleboro 11 scored 20-points in the fourth quarter to pull out a 27-13 victory in front of 5,000 fans at Community Field.
It was the blue and white’s first victory over North in three years, not quite the jinx described in the headline that ran in The Sun of Attleboro the following day.
The AHS win occurred 16 days before Dec. 7, 1941, the day 2,403 American lives and multiple U.S. Navy ships mulitple were lost at Pearl Harbor. That day of infamy resulted in America’s entry into World War II.
Americans were shocked again 20 years later when news broke in the early afternoon of Nov. 22, 1963, in Dallas, Texas. The entire country mourned when it was reported that President John F. Kennedy was shot and killed by an assassin as his motorcade drove through the downtown area.
Three days after Kennedy was laid to rest, Balfour Trophy winner Dick Bajnoci led Attleboro — now known as the Bombardiers — to a 14-6 win over the Rocketeers.
Twenty years to the day after Kennedy’s assassination, an estimated 7,500 fans witnessed the most dramatic ending in the history of the series. Trailing by five, North quarterback Jack Rioux connected with fleet-footed halfback Paul Lacasse for a 52-yard scoring pass on the game’s final play at Community Field.
I was listening to the game on WARA radio in hopes my dad would be mentioned during the post-game ceremony. Part of his duties back then was to award the Balfour Trophy to the game’s most valuable player.
He was on the Attleboro sideline during North’s improbable play and explained the disappointment he saw on the face of Attleboro coach Jim Cassidy, who had announced earlier in the year that the game would be the last of his distinguished career.
The Lacasse touchdown launched a North Attleboro dynasty. The Red Rocketeers went on to win 33 of the next 39 games over AHS, losing only four times with two ties.
One of those losses was also the first of the 33 Attleboro vs. North Attleboro games I’ve called on local cable and radio.
Fans of the Blue Bombardiers will remember that 1984 game because of the pass Stephen Peterson threw to Jeff Payette in the closing seconds for the day’s only touchdown.
Three days after the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe was signed on Nov. 19, 1990, ending the Cold War, North invaded Attleboro’s Tozier-Cassidy.
The Red Rocketeers took no prisoners in a 52-6 rout one year after Ray Beaupre’s squad stuffed Dale Caparaso’s Blue Bombardiers 62-14. The 114-20 margin is still a record for the largest differential for consecutive games.
While the aforementioned Tozier and Cassidy were legends at AHS, the Red Rocketeers have had their share, as well. Conrad Pensavalle, Bob Guthrie, Paul Sullivan and Ray Beaupre earned the same status coaching at NAHS, the latter having the high school field named after him.
As was the case with Pearl Harbor and the Kennedy assassination, Americans of all ages remember where they were the morning of Sept, 11, 2001, when terrorists flew a pair of planes into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York City, a third into the Pentagon building in Washington, D.C., and forced a fourth to crash in a field in Pennsylvsania field.
There was understandably a different feel to the football season that followed. Thanksgiving Day was like old times, however, as the Rocketeers rolled to another easy win 33-6.
The game marking the 100th anniversary of the Attleboro-North Attleboro rivalry was originally scheduled to be played last fall on Nov. 26 at Attleboro’s Tozier-Cassidy Field.
The coronavirus pandemic — which has now left more than 3 million dead worldwide with almost 600,000 dead in this country alone — forced not only that game, but the entire fall season to be cancelled and is why the football teams from the two communities will battle this Saturday morning at 10 a.m. — just like Thanksgiving Day — in the Centennial Game.
I’ll once again have one of the best seats in the house, calling the game for the 34th time. I invite you to join us on North TV’s Community Channel: Comcast 15 and Verizon 24 in North Attleboro and Comcast 11 in Plainville.
The game will also be streamed live on northtv.net.
It will be the first ever meeting of the two teams in April.
Yet another historic event in a rivalry like no other.
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